I was very impressed by Miss Nared's statement, and the clarity and dignity with which she expressed herself. She seems to me to be a kindred spirit to Napheesa.
I can also find some affinity to her initial extended reaction to Geno. I moved to Connecticut in 2004, having previously followed the WCBB team from a considerable distance. I had heard Geno being interviewed after games for brief moments, but I had never heard him talk about the team at any length.
When I moved to Connecticut and listened to The Geno Auriemma Show on CPTV, my immediate reaction to that extended interview was that he sounded far more like a professor than a basketball coach. Every thought and phrase was original and clearly his own; he did not speak in cliches like most coaches in most sports. (The only other sports figure in whom I noticed the same characteristic was Chris Evert -- from the time she came on the scene at age 16 or so, every word she said was clearly her own and represented her own original thinking.)
I think that even if Jamie Nared had been coached by Muffitt or Jeff or Tara or even Doug Bruno, she might well have had the same reaction to hearing Geno speak at length about basketball and college life for the first time. Granted, Holly (more than any of those coaches) seems to speak only in cliches, at least in public. But even so, listening to Geno is a unique experience compared to almost any other coach, at any level or in any sport.
